1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a method for displaying a home screen in a mobile terminal, and more particularly, to a method for adaptively displaying a home screen of a mobile terminal depending on the location of the mobile terminal.
2. Description of the Related Art
Mobile terminals such as smart phones and tablet Personal Computers (PCs) provide many useful features or functions to users with a wide variety of applications, evolving into devices capable of allowing the users to enjoy various types of services in addition to conventional voice calls.
The growing diversity of the functions implemented in the mobile terminal logically causes an increase in the number of types of applications capable of selecting and executing these functions. The more the user installs applications in his mobile terminal, the more the icons for running the applications will be displayed on one or more screens of the mobile terminal.
Given the size limitation of the display due to the portability of the mobile terminal, it is difficult to display, on a single screen, all icons of applications installed in the mobile terminal with a display having a limited size.
Conventionally, to address these and other problems, multiple screens are provided and icons of applications are placed on the individual screens, making it possible to switch screens as needed and run a specific application.
The conventional screen display methods will be described with reference to FIGS. 1A and 1B, on the assumption that 6 icons may be placed on each screen, and 3 screens are generated as the user creates 18 icons by installing 18 applications.
Referring to FIG. 1A, a user places icons 11 to 16 on a screen 10, icons 21 to 26 on a screen 20, and icons 31 to 36 on a screen 30. This conventional screen display method places icons of many applications on multiple screens 10 to 30, making it possible to install many applications even in a mobile terminal having a small display. However, if the number of applications installed in the mobile terminal increases causing an increase in the number of icons of the installed applications, it is difficult for the user to remember the screen on which is placed the icon of an application he desires to run. Therefore, the user must search for the icon by inconveniently switching between the screens.
To cure this problem, another conventional screen display method has been provided and will be described below with reference to FIG. 1B.
Generally, when multiple screens are provided, the conventional screen display method switches to the previous or next screen from the current screen if a screen switch key is input, or if a touch toward a specific direction, such as left or right, is input on the current screen.
Referring to FIG. 1B, a user may request a switch to a screen 20 by performing a touch input, such as a drag input, toward the left on the current screen 10. Thereafter, the user may request a switch to a screen 30 (the next screen following the new current screen 20) by performing a touch input toward the left on the current screen 20, or may request a switch back to the screen 10 (the screen preceding the new current screen 20) by performing a touch input to the right on the current screen 20.
The order of screen display is screen 10, followed by screen 20 and then screen 30. Thus, screen 10 displayed first is called a home screen, and icons of frequently used applications are placed on the home screen, for the sake of convenience. Therefore, the user may quickly switch to the home screen by performing an appropriate key input on the current non-home screen.
For example, the mobile terminal may quickly switch to the screen 10 (i.e., a home screen) if a switch key to a home screen is input on the current screen 30. An indication window 40 indicates the number (e.g., 3) of screens created in the mobile terminal, and also indicates the display order of the current screen among all the screens, using graphic effects 41, 42 and 43. In other words, because the screen 10 corresponds to a home screen, the graphic effect 41 indicates that the display order of the screen 10 is ‘first’, the graphic effect 42 indicates that the display order of the screen 20 is ‘second’, and the graphic effect 43 indicates that the display order of the screen 30 is ‘third’.
This conventional screen display method may promote rapid switching to the home screen on which icons of frequently used applications are placed. However, only one home screen is provided and the number of icons of applications capable of being placed on the home screen is limited, causing inconvenience to the user. Therefore, a need exists in the art to cure the aforementioned inconveniences caused by the conventional screen display method.